There's always a seat for you at the table!

Origins Recap

Origins was a complete blast! We had an amazing time! This was our first board game convention and it definitely won’t be our last.

It was great getting to be with amazing people within the gaming community. We weren’t sure at first how accepting everyone at ORIGINS would be, but it turned out to be quite an experience. Everyone there was amazingly accepting. As a queer couple, we felt very comfortable and never felt out of place or singled out for being who we were.

We had a fantastic time playing games with & getting to know some of these great people!

Amanda & Brad Scaggs of the Board Games with Panda podcast

Mandi, Stephane, & Tracy of To Die For Games

Patrick Hillier & Jamie Maltman of the WDYPTW podcast

Erin LaFlamme & Nicole Hoyt of Greatway Games

Mitch Schroeder

Carl Gannon

Andrew Smith of Board Game Quest

MKMK

Bruce Voge of the Party Gamecast

Ted Alspach of Bezier Games, The designer of WereWords, demoed a full game with us.

On of the great features of ORIGINS is the access to the Columbus Area Board game Society’s (CABS) Board Room. Many thanks to them & all their volunteers for providing access to their library of 1,000 plus board games. It was great to be able to play games that are out of print and/or we don’t have yet (especially Carcassonne: The Castle and Carcassonne: The City. I need to get my hands on those ~Marti).

We also got sneak peeks at the art, cards & components for a couple of expansions & games we have Kickstarted. Thanks for letting us view your pre production copies:

Bottom of the 9th: Clubhouse Expansion from Dice Hate Me Games. Darrell Louder, the co-designer, let us look at the only copy at ORIGINS

Delve from Indie Boards & Cards Travis

Cytosis from Genius Games

Champions of Midgard: Valhalla & the Dark Mountain Expansions from Grey Fox Games

Even though we didn’t get to catch a game or demo with you, we definitely enjoyed meeting & chatting with:

The incredible hosts of Nerd Night: JR Honeycutt of Restoration Games, Marguerite Cottrell of Meeples Included, & Stephanie Straw of On Board Games

All of the folks who organized the Punchboard Media event, especially Eric Buscemi of the Cardboard Hoard, and Brian Everett & Will Shorts of Cloak & Meeple

Gil Hova of Formal Ferret Games & the Ludology podcast

Ryan Laukat of Red Raven Games

The Chubby Meeple, Mark Burke

Mike Parkinson of the Board Game Makeover

Chaz Marler of Pair of Dice Paradise

Marty Connell of Rolling Dice & Taking Names

Rob Oren of Miniatures World

Last but not least: Tom Vasel, Zee Garcia, Sam Healy, & Eric Summerer. the Big Four of The Dice Tower Network

Last, but not least, here are 5 games that we haven’t mentioned yet and that we hadn’t played prior to Origins.

Marti:

Bohnaza: The Duel, published by Rio Grande Games. I love Bohnanza (usually referred to as “Beans” or “the Beans Game”). And I tried the old 2 player version and really didn’t like it that much. This one, however, gives you the feel of beans while working great for a 2 player atmosphere. It will be in our collection.

Deception: Murder in Hong Kong, published by Grey Fox Games. I loved this game. Like, absolutely blew my mind. I like social deduction games (because I like screwing with people’s heads) and this one is definitely a step up from others I have played. It keeps people guessing and makes it quite challenging to communicate with people about what is and isn’t correct.

WereWords, published by Bezier Games. This game. I got to try Insider (by Oink Games) a couple of times, but WereWords really takes that game (one person knows the word other than the main person and has to get everyone to guess with them) and makes it challenging because a werewolf is coming in and messing with everyone as well. Really enjoyed it and added it to our collection.

Kerala, published by Kosmos. Elephants, tile laying, really pretty Indian art, and a great little game that makes you think. This game really hit all of my buttons and wiggled in so that I have yet another tile laying game that I have fallen in love with. Excellent, can’t wait to add it to our collection.

Avenue, published by Aporta Games (not available in US). Oh man, this game. We played it… um. At least 3, maybe 4 times over the week. The simplicity of this flip and write (basically a roll and write with cards) is really unique and I love the challenge of making the cards that come up work for what you need. It verified that, yes, backing Kokoro by Indie Boards and Cards (their implementation of Avenue with a Kodama twist) was totally worth it.

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Sarah:

DiceBot MegaFun published by WizKids. This game lives up its name!! Each player is a robot, that has to find dice to match their weaponry & defeat their opponents. Quick, real time, fun, and fast.

Okey Dokey published by Tasty Minstrel Games. Everyone is working cooperatively to put on a music festival. You have to place fifty cards in five rows & ten columns, in number order & each row being of one color each. It is definitely a challenge – we own it now and haven’t won yet!

Honshu published by Renegade Game Studios. City building, card placement, resource management, & a unique bidding system. If any of these mechanisms appeal to you, give this one a try.

Rhino Hero: Super Battle by HABA. You are building an ever taller apartment complex & trying to be the highest animal super hero when the building collapses. The roll of the dice determines your movement & if you are on the same level as your opponents you must battle it out, with more dice rolling, to see who gets to stay in that level & who goes down one level.

Flipships published by Renegade Game Studios. This is the first cooperative dexterity game that I have ever seen, and it was pretty cool. You are flicking your ships in order to stop the oncoming alien attacks & invasion. This has been called Space Invaders, the Board game. It is fun & challenging since you have many different ships to take down & of course the Mothership.